Poll: Was It Wrong To Drop The Atomic Bombs In Japan?

[Starke]

-The Japanese would never surrender (their beliefs at the time prohibited such a thing), necessitating a drawn-out and destructive conflict between them and the United States before the war could end.

-The bombs certainly did end the war in the Pacific. Whether or not it could have been won without them is debatable (and difficult to prove either way), but leveling a city with a single explosion sends a pretty strong message.

-The Japanese had enough of an air force to get to Pearl Harbor and do a lot of damage.

I'm not saying we should use nuclear weapons ever again, but if you add up the death toll and compare it to what would have resulted from a drawn-out war with Japan, the bombs probably killed fewer people.

Indeed. It's one of those things that are considered a "necessary evil". It would be far worse for the Japanese if they kept there old warlords or if we removed them by Invasion. I'd say nuking is inherently wrong, but that the circumstances demanded it regardless.

If I could amend it, the first nuke was a strong message, the second one was to prove we could do it again.

 

[DarkPanda XIII]

Seriously? Must we talk about this?

Here, here's some grape juice for everyone, Ignore this conversation!

 

[nightwolf667]

Seriously? Must we talk about this?

Here, here's some grape juice for everyone, Ignore this conversation!

Ah! Sensibility! How I've missed you!

 

[MorganL4]

when asked, "can we fix it?" bob the builder responds with a resounding, "YES WE CAN!"

 

[Audioave10]

^^ You need to learn your history. Wrong or right, there was no choice, it HAD to be done.

I never said it did not have to be done, you need to learn to read.

Hey dude...that post was not for you anyway...I was late...excuse me! (as Jim Carrey would say)

 

[nightwolf667]

i think one is justifiable.
sure, my history knowledge suxorz, but i don't see why they had to drop two.

I don't know if anyone's answered this for you yet but: one to prove they had it. Two to prove they could do it again. The doing it again was the scary part.

 

[JJMUG]

^^ You need to learn your history. Wrong or right, there was no choice, it HAD to be done.

I never said it did not have to be done, you need to learn to read.

Hey dude...that post was not for you anyway...I was late...excuse me! (as Jim Carrey would say)

My apologies.

 

[mchoueiri]

If we had invaded japan we would of love more lives on both sides. So it was one swift way to end the war.

 

[mchoueiri]

If we had invaded japan we would of lost more lives on both sides. So it was one swift way to end the war.

 

[Nopenahnuhuh]

You know what they say about choosing the lesser of two evils. The atom bomb wasn't only a message to the japs but a message to the entire world. Remember, around this point in time the Soviet bear was about as powerful as the US, they were locked in a war of ideologies and had just stumbled at each other's fronts when Germany fell.

The US needed a way to show the world it wasn't to be trifled with, a message to the reds that while Europe was within their grasp, it wouldn't be wise to measure power with those alied to the Capitalist countries of the west. The nukes were just that: a message of power. Had the US not done it the reds could have kept on going, hell! Europe was on it's knees, France was still in shambles, England was in ruins, every other country had little firepower to match the commies, at that point in time the USSR could've kept on going untill the entire continent was red, but the bombings kept them at bay for a while.

In all honesty, after all the world went through between 1945 and 1991, we're very lucky to be alive and owe our lives to what can only be described as an expertly executed demonstration of diplomatic brilliance on both sides. Had diplomacy failed after the nuclear strikes on Japan the Russian allies would have just kept on going, if diplomacy had failed during the Cuban missile crisis the world would have been a much more inhospitable place for us.

 

[Starke]

You raise some very good points, I'm going to do some splicing to address them directly.

What I find far more interesting than the topic itself is the recent shift in attitude towards WW2 on the internet. We've always known the Axis were bad, but over the last couple of years there's been an increasingly vocal group villyfing the Allies as well in some sort of counter culture thing.

I'm not completely sure if its related, but there's also been a resurgence in fascist ideology in the last decade or so. This isn't a heavy handed critique of the Bush Doctrine, I mean, individuals who explicitly espouse a fascist ideology.

For one thing I don't really get the point of it all. WW2 is history now, an all out war from a different era. And it's not like we've been lied to or anything, for real historians all the information is documented to be studied & debated, while the rest of the population learns about it in high school and/or some form of entertainment and generally adopt a 'we did what we had to' attitude and don't question it.

I'd actually take exception to the "we haven't been lied to". I don't mean we've been lied to fundamentally, but World War II is one of the first real examples of modern intelligence apparati. Which is honestly one of the things that makes it interesting. The entire point of RUSE is to play around within that concept of deceiving the enemies. So, yes, we were lied to, but not in a critical way.

Fast forward 20 years, and the US is embroiled in a war that the sitting president (LBJ) actually does lie about... actually, I'm going to change stream for this.

We see the first counterculture movement in the United States during the Johnson administration because Johnson has a bad habit of bullshitting at the expense of a transparent government.

Now, we have George W. Bush. Bush doesn't approach the truth with nearly the cavalier attitude that Johnson took, but, we see a lesser resurgence. American jingoism is resurrecting World War II now, instead of, with Johnson, his attempt to justify Vietnam and portray it as a heroic war.

There could be a direct association here, I apologize if I'm not making a really coherent argument, I'll chew on it a bit and get back to you.

But recently there's been many people like this:

I can't believe so many people actually voted no, but theres America for you....

I wouldn't have a problem with what they did if they had targeted something to do with the Japanese military but they dropped both bombs on cities full of civilians. What they did is worse than 9/11. They proved a point so that they wouldn't lose men fighting on land which is admirable but even if they detonated off the coast as a warning Japan would know the game is up.

If I was in charge the bastards would be up for war crimes... but it's just my opinion, now all I have to do is wait for it to get torn up by a rabid horde of Americas patriots.

To which I don't get the point of it all. That last part especially, you do realize tyou'd be digging up corpses to put on trial right?

Something that's bugged me with arguing with... well, people online the last few years is the utter absence of logic. This is an example of it, on the part of Bobzer.

Is this because of some sort of Che Guevara like counter culture thing?

I think it's a reaction against Bush, as I mentioned above, but I'm not 100% sure.

Is it because we have a generation growing up whose grand parents weren't involved in WW2 and don't have that same respected reverence for them that my generation does?

I think, unfortunately, this has cut both ways. The scarcity of WWII veterans today made it easier to re-brand the war as America's shining moment of glory, in our pop culture, and this could simply be a reaction to that.

Or maybe it's a generation that grew up in Europe free from the grips of war after the USSR collapsed, that have become anti-American due to the current shenanigans in Iraq and apply the same lofty "fight soldiers & insurgents only, never harm civilians" standard to the past?

Again, as an American, we've painted ourselves into a corner. On one hand, we used WWII as a rallying point for patriotism. Then we got the, now mostly discredited "war on terror" that was being tapped into the same sentiment. It is, to an extent, only natural that some would then take their frustrations with the War on Terror out on the perceptions of WWII.

Really I just don't get where this all started from, and consider this far more interesting than the actual discussion it creates. And before anyone like the poster I quoted calls me a patriotic American or something I'm actually Canadian.

You raise some really interesting points I hadn't considered.

 

[nightwolf667]

What I find far more interesting than the topic itself is the recent shift in attitude towards WW2 on the internet. We've always known the Axis were bad, but over the last couple of years there's been an increasingly vocal group villyfing the Allies as well in some sort of counter culture thing.

For one thing I don't really get the point of it all. WW2 is history now, an all out war from a different era. And it's not like we've been lied to or anything, for real historians all the information is documented to be studied & debated, while the rest of the population learns about it in high school and/or some form of entertainment and generally adopt a 'we did what we had to' attitude and don't question it. But recently there's been many people like this:

I can't believe so many people actually voted no, but theres America for you....

I wouldn't have a problem with what they did if they had targeted something to do with the Japanese military but they dropped both bombs on cities full of civilians. What they did is worse than 9/11. They proved a point so that they wouldn't lose men fighting on land which is admirable but even if they detonated off the coast as a warning Japan would know the game is up.

If I was in charge the bastards would be up for war crimes... but it's just my opinion, now all I have to do is wait for it to get torn up by a rabid horde of Americas patriots.

To which I don't get the point of it all. That last part especially, you do realize tyou'd be digging up corpses to put on trial right? Is this because of some sort of Che Guevara like counter culture thing? Is it because we have a generation growing up whose grand parents weren't involved in WW2 and don't have that same respected reverence for them that my generation does? Or maybe it's a generation that grew up in Europe free from the grips of war after the USSR collapsed, that have become anti-American due to the current shenanigans in Iraq and apply the same lofty "fight soldiers & insurgents only, never harm civilians" standard to the past?

Really I just don't get where this all started from, and consider this far more intesting than the actual discussion it creates. And before anyone like the poster I quoted calls me a patriotic American or something I'm actually Canadian.

Honestly, I agree with you and I don't understand it either. It's true that both the Allies and the Axis committed their fair share of atrocities (though the Axis certainly more than the Allies), the French and Russians did horrible things to the German citizens after the War and that certainly shouldn't be forgotten. But at the same time, I don't understand all this talk about how America was just as bad as Hitler and the fascists, that dropping the bombs were war crimes, etc. It seems like so many posters and I assume most are young posters, who live in this sort of fantasy land and the best thing they have to associate the atrocities of the wars with is 9/11. Then again, while we call it a war, the War on Terror really isn't one, it's barely even a peacekeeping operation. I grew up in the 90s when the world was on the edge of going to shit once again, and even I know that that experience can't compare to what my parents went through with Vietnam or what my grandparents lived through with WWII. My mother's family is British having immigrated when she was three, and her mother lived through the German Air Raids when civilians were, no matter what anyone said, fair targets.

It's nice to have such lofty aspirations, but again I think you're right. These are the sentiments of those of us fortunate enough to have never grown up in war time, when we measure deaths in the thousands not the hundreds of thousands or even the millions. Heck, what about all ethnic cleansings that happened in the 90s, Yugoslavia breaking apart and you getting Bosnia, Serbia, and Kosovo all trying to kill each other. Well, the Serbs trying to kill everyone else. Rwanda. Apartheid ending in 1994. Now, you don't see American soldiers bodies getting dragged through the streets in Somalia at night on the news. I still remember in middle school being told about the bombings in Bosnia when America got involved in 1998, having it brought up in the classroom with my teacher tracking our interaction by putting the headlines up on the walls. It was only little over ten years ago, but I guess that's how fast people forget.

You are right though and it's a very interesting debate.

 

[myogaman]

Japanese tortured POWs and EPWs
The Japanese tortured damned near every Chinese citizen they found.
They would find a pregnant woman, take bets on whether it was a boy or girl, then cut open the womb of the woman to let the baby out, then skewer the baby by throwing it into the air and letting it fall on their bayonets.
The Japanese would starve anyone who they captured.
The Japanese would kill themselves AND the American corpsman trying to help them if they were wounded. The Japanese would mutilate the bodies of the people they killed (cutting off the genitalia and stuffing it in the victim's mouth is the most popular way they did it). The Japanese taught their children to commit suicide rather than let Americans occupy their villages (on Okinawa)
The Japanese killed 20,000,000 innocent Chinese citizens. The VAST majority of whom were noncombatants.

In my opinion, the Japanese in the 1930s and 1940s are the most disgusting, vile, and atrocious human beings in modern warfare. I can't speak for the rest of history, seeing as I haven't studied it as thoroughly, but I'm pretty sure they're up there for the most fucked up human beings of all time.

I wouldn't go as far as all time but the Japanese were very, very sick and twisted back then. Most fans of Japan and weaboos don't even know this part of their history, only the feudal and the modern side of the story. And while they were this bad 80 years ago, they aren't today.

 

[Flight]

I think it was wrong, especially considering the damage atomic bombs do (see "Threads" and "When the Wind Blows"). Even if violence was necessary, I believe they could have found another way to do it. It wasn't the citizens they were fighting, at least not directly; it was cowardly to attack them.

 

[kiralon]

Killing civilians in war is ALWAYS wrong, and despite all of the positive effects it had I will never argue it was a good thing.

But these days civilians are truly part of the war machine, supplying the armies so that they can fight, im not saying you should kill non-combatants, but they are definately part of the fight and will be casualties in a war, and from what i understand the japanese wouldnt have surrendered anyway (not sure if they are real but i heard stories of lone soldiers years later causing problems because they didnt know the war had ended) so it sort of saved lives.

 

[Codeman90]

Sure, they might have surrendered, but let me ask you this. If a foreign army invaded your country, landed on your shores and began an attack, would you fight for your home? An attack on Japan would have likely steeled the resolve of the Japanese people causing a massive conflict.

Back this up with orders from the Emperor to fight and the Japanese Propoganda (yes the EVIL AMERICAN PROPAGANDA isn't the only war propaganda out there) branded the American army has ruthless. They were told we didn't take prisoners. In the end, as horrilbe as the bombs were (fire bombing is horrific too but nobody cares about that sadly) I believe it was nessecary.

 

[elricik]

We did the hard thing, the thing that needed to be done. I don't entirely agree with dropping a second bomb but at the time we had no idea how much damage the first one did, we had no way of knowing what happened. We gave them an ultimatum and they thought we were bluffing, after evaporating a few hundred thousand people, we finally came to an agreement. I firmly believe that the Japanese would have fought to the death if we kept attacking the soldiers and invading the islands, they were kamikazes after all.

 

[myogaman]

right. So I believe this thread is dead. Every argument stated, every side picked, every opinion given, and even a few illogical rages.

Instead of reposting and reposting and starting flamewars because someone questions your opinion or plays the devil's advocate, read the entire 26 pages and learn a little history.

This thread has now been deemed a lesson in History to broaden people's views and knowledge on what happened in World War 2. As an USA citizen, all I learned in class was "Germany did this with Hitler then we bombed Japan." I am glad this thread has arisen to teach me and others the very different sides of the war and the unique perspectives given by each poster.

I think most Americans don't understand that the presence of nuclear arms marked a new era and lead the world close to destruction. Like many have said, not only was the bomb to end a bloody war that could have destroyed Japan, it told the USSR to back off from Japan.

We were lucky in that all territory (to my knowledge) was restored to what it was pre-WWII and I believe the A-Bomb helped to do that.

I now beg you all to stop posting unless you have something to add that was not already written. If your opinion really matters that much, you don't belong in a historical debate.

 

[Manatee Slayer]

Ok, well... as for the first point, why would an island nation have no navy? (I don't know the facts of this one, which is why I'm asking)

For the second, yes, many high ranking officials wanted to give up. Only one's opinion mattered (Hirohito)

And as for the third, I think he meant, bombs from planes, like the bombing Germany did on London. I haven't read his book though, so I'm not sure.

Please correct me if I'm wrong though . Oh, but I say it was necessary, though wrong.

They did have an air-force and a navy at the beginning of the war but i was mostly destroyed during the war.

The officials I'm talking about are American.

I'm completely certain it was he atomic bomb he was talking about. I's what the entire chapter was about. here is a quote earlier in the post, if you care that much (which I'm sure you don't) it's somewhere around page 20, maybe later.

Manatee Slayer:
-The Japanese were terrified by the thought of the Russians coming, due to the fact they had lost to them before and that they would probably take over the country and install communism.

HAHA

Okay, I'm sorry. Seriously? I know you said you didn't do much research, but Russia LOST the Russo-Japanese war in 1906. Making Russia the first European power to lose a war against an Asiatic state. And, while the Russians were turning around after having just curb stomped the Germans, the Japanese had no reason to really fear a Russian invasion. The Russians were involved for about five days before the end of the war (raw recollection).

As I said earlier in he thread, I didn't mention any war, I was talking about two much smaller battles closer to World War 2, in which the Japanese lost very quickly. It's also why the Japanese didn't go too far north in China. they also were scared of Russia occupying the
country.

Yeah... I'm sorry, the points are about as historically accurate as Abe Lincoln riding a Dinosaur at the battle of Marathon.

Love the simile by the way lol. I do however disagree with the statement. I am not saying they are all perfectly accurate but a lot of them are correct. i have supplied links throughout this thread for each one of hem. lol I will try and at least find he one about American Officials, because ha really is true.

EDIT: Here ya go mate.

http://www.colorado.edu/AmStudies/lewis/2010/atomicdec.htm

I now beg you all to stop posting unless you have something to add that was not already written. If your opinion really matters that much, you don't belong in a historical debate.

While I do believe this thread has become rather large I did want to find out people's opinions based on their moral and ethical code, and also based on things that I didn't know before asking this question. I really have learnt a lot about WW2, or at least because of so many conflicting statements learned some sections to properly read into.